Our Florida Holiday

Yes!  This is my feverish attempt to try to beat Tammy and post first about our holiday to Florida.  And I believe I'm successful, but prepare yourself - it gets a bit long. 

We are back, and  I'm finally unpacked, 10 loads of laundry done, our summer clothes put back into storage, and the nice glow of a tan already seems to be slipping away from all of us as we bundle to stay warm against the chilly 45 degree weather (I know MN, SD people - but the weather is all relative, right?!?)

We had such a great vacation in Florida.  It was just absolutely perfect.  I'll recount a few highlights of the trip:

We started Wednesday morning by waking the kids at 5:30 am.  We have not breathed a word of our trip to them beforehand, so they were a bit bewildered about the early wake up a bit intrigued by the 'surprise trip' we were going on.  Campbelle guessed as to our destination for about 3 hours before correctly guessing Disney World.  And then, much to our amazement she wasn't as ecstatic as we anticipated.  Instead, she looked a bit worrisome and asked quietly "Do we have enough money for this trip?"  (You see, at every commercial or inquiry about going to Disney World from her for the previous months, I would tell her that we would go someday, and that it was expensive and not just a place you could go to without planning and saving.)  When she was assured that we were indeed ok financially, she then got really excited about the thought of all the princesses and castles galore.

The second big surprise came later that night in Orlando.  You see, we hadn't told them about seeing their cousins Maddie and Will either - so the look on their faces when they came knocking on our hotel door was of pure shock.  In fact, both kids said nothing - but just slowly backed away from the door in utter amazement.  When it finally sunk in, there were tons of hugs, kisses and lots of giggling going around.

Thursday morning was the Magic Kingdom.  It was so much fun to see the look of wonder on their faces.  Campbelle told me she felt like she was in a dream.

We covered so much ground that day - Dumbo ride, car chase, Buzz Lightyear, Small World, Peter Pan, Mickey's Philharmonic, Toonville, Snow White, etc.... what a jammed packed day.  We ended it with a character dinner with Pooh and all his friends.  Christian was far less interested in talking to the characters -- he kept a very safe distance from them (unless physically pushed.)

By the end of that day, we had a few very exhausted kids.

Epcot was Day 2.  It started off a bit crabby for Christian - but with a rental stroller to take a break in, he got used the fast pace again.  He has no idea that these guys are standing behind him during his crabby moment.

And of course no trip to Epcot would be complete without taking in all the Norwegian culture.  Oh, my dear little Vikings!

The highlight of Day 2 for Campbelle (and I think Christian fancied it a bit too) was a Princess lunch.  Here she got to meet all the princesses.

And like I said, I think Christian fancied it a bit too.  Can you tell who his favorite princess was??

Day #3 was Animal Kindgom.  The highlight of that day was the African safari ride, Leif went on a crazy rollercoaster called Everest, and the Dinosaur Boneyard where you could dig for dinosaur bones.

 

 

We also talked to Mickey and wished him a Merry Christmas.

That marked the end of our Disney World portion - now it was on the beach and Sanibel Island where Dad, Marva and Gina joined us  for some relaxing and playing in the sun.  And we did a whole lot of just that....

Here's Leif working this quick camera action:

Christmas Eve service was held on the beach.  It was so very cool - a far different Christmas Eve service than I've ever experienced.

   

Thankfully Santa was able to track us down at the beach by Christmas morning.  There were loads of presents for all the kids to enjoy.

Santa gave the kids a Mickey and Minnie to remember their trip.

 

They are well loved and a nice cozy comfort at the end of long days.

We 'decorated' for Christmas the Island way.... we made Christmas tree on the beach, complete with toys under it.

Oh, and did I mention we played... ALOT!

Would you take a look at the vertical lift that Bill achieves on that jump!!

"Ha ha, got you that time Leif!!"

Sadly our vacation was coming to an end.  On Thursday everyone flew out of Fort Myers and my clan headed back to Orlando to catch a plane the following day.  We did take in SeaWorld and Downtown Disney before we said our goodbyes to sunny Florida.

Now aside from actually feeling the warmth of the sun on your skin, did you feel like you were right there with us on our vacation?  Or was it just plain too much details.  Well, I warned you didn't I?

We had such a great holiday, and best of all it was so much fun to be with family.  We've feel truly fortunate to have had such a great holiday season... from Thanksgiving with the Brenne's through Christmas in Florida.  We love our families so much and so glad to share such wonderful memories with all of them.   My hope is 2008 brings more of the same fantastic family times together... and hoping your 2008 is bright, full of laughter and love as well!